"Huge salty man tears"

We had our 20 week scan earlier this week. The big scan as they call it.

After a couple of tries because baby was in the wrong position and wasn’t co-operating, and after lot of the goo was emptied onto Jenny’s belly, the doctor was able to check everything, and we got a good view of the little ‘un along with a few pictures to show around family and friends, over which they’ll no doubt make predictions on the sex of the child.

But we got to see everything. Body parts that are more or less fully formed. Little feet. Little hands too. A little nose. A little spine. A little stomach. A little bladder. A little brain. A little heart. And a little face. A little human being that we made.

And he/she did a little dance as well that we could see.

And I cried.

SHUT UP! You’ll cry too. I’d put money on that.

A little background first though: I rarely cry. I’m not saying that to sound all macho and manly. It’s just a fact. Well, a fact and a lie, because I also cry all the time.

Let me explain.

Things in real life rarely make me cry. Sad events that normally make people blub don’t usually have an effect on me. I’ve had relatives die, gone to funerals, and stubbed my toe on the edge of the bath, all without a hint of a tear. The same goes for happy things: I didn’t cry at my own wedding for instance*. All of which makes me sound like a cold, emotionless robot, but believe me I’m not. I think I’ve just sort of steeled myself against things that happen in real life. Because I’m almost expected to cry, I brace myself and end up not letting the tears roll.

*A fact my wife reminded me of on the occasion that I done a happy cry when Didier Drogba won the Champions League for us with his last kick of the ball in a Chelsea shirt. That still gets me emotional to be honest.

Yet when it comes to fictional things, I will cry, ironically, like a baby. I tear up incredibly easily watching something – anything – in TV or film. The bit when Buzz doesn’t make the window in Toy Story? Floods. When Jessie sings about her former owner in Toy Story 2? Buckets. When the toys are inching ever closer to the furnace in Toy Story 3? Streams down my face. Maybe I should just stop watching Toy Story films.

Point is: real life? No tears. Film and TV? Full on gurning.

Until now…

Now I didn’t do an ugly cry while we were in the room, mid-goo, but rather when we went back out to the waiting room to wait to see the midwife to get some more information on parenting classes and further appointments and the like. I was already on the edge during the scan, but being the manly man I am I held off on crying until we were alone again. But once we were…boy, did I ever? Jenny didn’t, but her hormones are up the left anyways at the minute, and sometimes she cries just for a laugh so who knows…maybe she cried later. Although immediately post scan she rushed to the toilet to empty her bladder (they advise you to drink loads beforehand to get a better scan picture) so maybe there was no more liquid left in her body after that. Or perhaps more likely she was just relieved and didn’t have the energy to cry*. It’d been a while since our first scan at 9 weeks when Jenny was in the hospital boking and getting put on a drip, and while there was a little baby in there, the scan picture then wasn’t really much to go on. Seeing the actual outline, hands, feet and all was a huge relief for the both of us.

*She might well have been crying herself, but I didn’t notice through my own tear streaked face.

Maybe I’d just been keeping everything bottled up – I’ve been told I do that – over the past 11 weeks since then and the relief I felt came out a huge salty man tears. Maybe The Fear that I’m going to be a dad hit me and I broke down there and then. Or maybe it was just an emotional moment.

And you know what? I’m happy that I did. It was a supremely joyous occasion and the first time I’ve experienced it. Who knows if it’ll ever happen again? I hope that if it does I’ll have the same kind of reaction. I’m absolutely 100% glad I cried.

Just don’t tell anyone, k?